On the City Council -- and collecting a city paycheck

Brian Lockhart

Updated 12:08 am, Saturday, April 19, 2014

BRIDGEPORT -- After at least receiving a public hearing last year, a controversial effort in the General Assembly to keep city employees off of the City Council is going nowhere this legislative session.

"They're like, `We're not letting this cat out of the bag like we did last year'," said state Rep. Jack Hennessy, D-Bridgeport, who has bucked Bridgeport Democrats by trying to close a loophole in state law the city attorney cites as the reason council members can simultaneously hold city jobs, despite language in the Bridgeport charter to the contrary.

Critics call it a potential conflict of interest, particularly during the spring budget season.

The council members and their allies argue that they recuse themselves from votes specifically involving their jobs.

They also maintain that their positions sometimes give them valuable insight that helps them govern, and it is up to constituents to decide if they should serve.

But the Bridgeport charter clearly states that no member of the council can also receive a city paycheck.

When the question has arisen in recent years, the city attorney's office has said the charter is overridden by a state statute granting municipal employees the right to serve in local government as long as they are not supervising themselves.

State law does allow municipalities to block public workers from joining local finance boards.

Bridgeport eliminated its finance board several years ago, granting those responsibilities to the council.

Hennessy wants to allow cities and towns to impose similar restrictions on council candidates.

Last year Hennessy's conflict-of-interest proposal was given a public hearing and was passed by the legislature's Planning and Development Committee on to the full General Assembly. But Hennessy was unable to convince leaders of the House of Representatives to bring it up for a vote and pass it along to the Senate.

The proposal is viewed as very Bridgeport-centric, which means it needs strong, proactive support from a united legislative delegation to have a chance of survival.

House Speaker Brendan Sharkey, D-Hamden, at the time said the bulk of Bridgeport's all-Democratic delegation was against the proposal. That included the city's two state senators, Andres Ayala and Anthony Musto.

Attempts to amend the proposal so it would only affect future candidates, rather than ousting existing council members, still did not gain the needed support.

This year Hennessy tried -- and failed -- to convince the chairmen of the Planning and Development Committee to even raise the bill.

Each committee has two chairmen, one from the House and one from the Senate. Hennessy alleges the House co-chair, Rep. Jason Rojas, D-East Hartford, feared his own bills would languish in the Senate if he let the conflict-of-interest proposal see the light of day.

Asked if he was under the impression he would face payback for pursuing Hennessy's proposal, Rojas said no.

He said it came down to the simple fact that as opposed to last year, this is a short legislative session.

"I went to members of the committee and it's not a debate that we wanted to have again in the short session, basically," Rojas said. "Given the kind of crush of bills that we were expecting in the committee, it was just one that folks didn't want to go through again."

Rojas noted he has never had a conversation with either Ayala or Musto about the bill. And both Ayala and Musto said they never broached the topic, either.

"It's absolutely ridiculous," Musto said of Hennessy's claims.

"Each chair develops the agenda for their committees," Ayala said. "I don't control (the) agenda for the Planning and Development Committee."

State Rep. Auden Grogins, D-Bridgeport, who co-sponsored the legislation last year and is the only Bridgeport legislator on the Planning & Development Committee, said Rojas offered her the same explanation. She said it is understandable.

"There's so many things we can't do in this short period of time," she said.

There's also been a change in leadership on the committee.

Last year, Hennessy had an ally in state Sen. Steve Cassano, D-Manchester, who at the time was the Planning and Development Committee's Senate co-chairman.

But Cassano is now vice chairman, replaced by Sen. Catherine Osten, D-Sprague, who in a statement said, "It didn't make any sense to bring a bill out because the issue appears to be resolving itself on a local level through the election process."

Two Council incumbents on the city payroll -- Warren Blunt and Richard Bonney, both from the 135th District -- were ousted during last year's Democratic primaries. But Milta Feliciano, D-136, head of Bridgeport's veteran's affairs office, won a council seat.

Hennessy's bill is a particularly sensitive issue for Musto. Musto is facing a potential Democratic primary challenge later this year from Marilyn Moore, an ex-state Senate staffer who has run against Musto in the past.

Hennessy has said he supports Moore's bid.

Moore is citing Musto's opposition to the conflict-of-interest legislation as another reason he needs to go.

Musto stands by his opposition to Hennessy's bill.

"This is basically a local issue -- a local vendetta, really -- by people angry at some on the City Council. They can't vote them off, so they want to try to get them fired by state law," Musto said. "I think it's completely inappropriate to use state law for that. People should be able to run for offices and, if the voters don't want them there because they see a problem, then they won't vote for them."

Asked if he would back a bill that grandfathered in existing council members who have city jobs, Musto said no.